Nonprofit Marketing; 15 Best Low Cost Marketing Ideas for 2013

By Thomas R. Reich PhD

Nonprofit Organizations can benefit greatly in 2013 from improved marketing plans. Many charity directors don’t see the need for a cohesive marketing plan, they think marketing is expensive and for larger nonprofits. Let’s look at low cost marketing ideas that can really boost your organization in 2013.

To make this work, remember that in the past, most every nonprofit organization bought yellow page adds. The yellow pages are dead, but good marketing replaces its exposure, without some of the low cost marketing ideas discussed here, charities may be seriously underexposed.

1) Your first low cost marketing idea is to create and maintain a good functioning organization website. Your website is you’re on line office, your virtual spot for donations, the first impression many potential donors and volunteers have of your organization and yes, it is your new yellow page add. Your website should also be an information resource for your cause and services.

2) Develop a new brand identity; this low cost marketing idea may be easier than you think. How long has it been since you’ve updated your website or marketing materials? Maybe it’s time to take a fresh look and redesign your image, take advantage of the digital domain. Donors and volunteers respond to new ideas and information which has been optimized for the internet.

3) Survey existing donors, a low cost marketing idea which is easier than you may think. How do your volunteers feel about your cause and services? Stay in touch through informal lunches or a professionally coordinated survey campaign. A survey is an excellent method for taking the pulse of your audience. The survey should include detailed questions about your cause and services and how they directly benefit the community.

4) Make a list of your strengths; this can be another low cost marketing idea generator. Are you the cause leader in your area? Is your organization the most experienced? Do you have the highest quality service? Try to list between 50 and 100 different and measurable strengths. This is a great exercise to develop new ideas for your marketing campaigns

5) Now time for an easy, low cost marketing idea, one you need to do now! The donor is always right… always. The time to prove this statement is when the donor experiences a problem with your cause or service. Make a point to take responsibility and solve any problems that a donor or volunteer might have immediately. Satisfied associats turn into repeat, long-term donors and supporters.

6) This next tip is a low cost marketing idea if it helps you with the previous two ideas. Take a large donor out to lunch. Now is the time to ask a reliable donor out to lunch. Touch base with them to see how your organization is solving problems and meeting their needs and expectations.

7) Well here is the cost, though still a low cost marketing idea if you follow these guidelines. Establish an annual marketing budget. A good rule-of-thumb estimate for your marketing budget is 3% to 5% of annual revenues. Organizations that sell products or services need to budget 7% to 10% of annual sales for their marketing budgets. Your budget should include a breakdown of all marketing costs including printing, social media, website maintenance and advertising and sponsorship placement.

8) Here is a very low cost marketing idea, but arguably the most important you can consider. Be positive in your outlook. It’s important to feel good about yourself and enjoy what you do for a living. If you have a positive attitude about your job, you will succeed by transferring that enthusiasm to other employees, donors and prospective volunteers.

9) *****A low cost marketing idea should always look at social media. Pinterestis one of the newest and most effective parts of a social media exposure for your program. You can find out more in these articles:

10) *****Low cost marketing idea #10 is to establish and maintain a good active Twitter account. To learn more about Twitter and how to make it effective for your orginazation, check out these suggestions:

11) *****Moving along with low cost marketing idea #11 have you fully updated your LinkedIn account on a regular basis? You must be at 100% on your profile, as a Director of a nonprofit organization you need to update every week, you need an organization page. Want to know more, take a look at:

14) *****The best low cost marketing idea I can give you is this. Learn how to connect your website, blog, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTubeand any other social media fads that appear in 2013 into a network. Learn how to use back links and directories. The more you work on your on-line presents, the more your organization will benefit!

15) Here is your top low cost marketing idea for 2013; in fact it is the most important idea you will hear in regards to marketing. In order for anything we have talked about to truly succeed, you need to develop a solid marketing plan! You need a road map, a plan to keep you on track to sustainable goals, and a ruler to judge your success. Part of this plan should include your established budget and an ongoing record of each facet of your marketing plans success to determine what worked and what to rethink. All low cost marketing ideas are successful if you learn and grow from them.

Bonus Low Cost Marketing Idea: Consider hiring a marketing company to help you with a complete formula, if marketing is not your thing. A firm that does marketing for lots of companies can often deliver a great marketing campaign at a very low cost compared to struggling with a part of running a nonprofit organization that can confuse many. Be careful, there are a lot of firms that clam to know what they are doing, hire a firm that trains you to maintain your marketing plan.

With low cost marketing idea generating help, a good digital identity, a well branded nonprofit organization and attention paid to your donors and beneficiaries’ needs, success will be yours in 2013!

Best 15 Low Cost Marketing Ideas for Your Small Business in 2013

By Thomas R. Reich PhD

Small Businesses can benefit greatly in 2013 from an improved low cost marketing idea and plan or 15 ideas if you will. Many small businesses owners don’t see the need for a cohesive marketing plan, they think marketing is expensive and for larger companies. Let’s look at low cost marketing ideas that can really boost your small business in 2013.

To make this work, remember that in the past, every small business bought yellow page adds. The yellow pages are dead, but good marketing replaces its exposure, without some of the low cost marketing ideas discussed here, small businesses may be seriously underexposed.

1) Your first low cost marketing idea is to create and maintain a good functioning company website. Your website is you’re on line office, your virtual sales floor, the first impression many potential customers have of your small business and yes, it is your new yellow page add. Your website should also be an information resource for your products and services.

2) Develop a new brand identity; this low cost marketing idea may be easier than you think. How long has it been since you’ve updated your website or marketing materials? Maybe it’s time to take a fresh look and redesign your image, take advantage of the digital domain. Customers and prospects respond to new ideas and information which has been optimized for the internet.

3) Survey existing customers, a low cost marketing idea which is easier than you may think. How do your customers feel about your products and services? Stay in touch through informal lunches or a professionally coordinated survey campaign. A survey is an excellent method for taking the pulse of your audience. The survey should include detailed questions about your products and services and how they directly benefit the customer.

4) Make a list of your strengths, this can be another low cost marketing idea generator. Are you the low price leader? Is your business the most experienced? Do you have the highest quality product or service? Try to list between 50 and 100 different and measurable strengths. This is a great exercise to develop new ideas for your marketing campaigns

5) Now time for an easy, low cost marketing idea, one you need to do now! The customer is always right… always. The time to prove this statement is when the customer experiences a problem with your product or service. Make a point to take responsibility and solve any problems that a customer might have immediately. Satisfied customers turn into repeat, long-term customers.

6) This next tip, is a low cost marketing idea if it helps you with the previous two ideas. Take a customer out to lunch. Now is the time to ask a reliable customer out to lunch. Touch base with them to see how your company is solving problems and meeting their needs.

7) Well here is the cost, though still a low cost marketing idea if you follow these guidelines. Establish an annual marketing budget. A good rule-of-thumb estimate for your marketing budget is 3% to 5% of annual sales. Retail businesses need to budget 7% to 10% of annual sales for their marketing budgets. Your budget should include a breakdown of all marketing costs including printing, social media, website maintenance and advertising placement.

8) Here is a very low cost marketing idea, but arguably the most important you can consider. Be positive in your outlook. It’s important to feel good about yourself and enjoy what you do for a living. If you have a positive attitude about your job, you will succeed by transferring that enthusiasm to other employees, customers and prospects.

9) *****A low cost marketing idea should always look at social media. Pinterest is one of the newest and most effective parts of a social media exposure program. You can find out more in these 3 articles:7 Free Pinterest Tools; Things to get You Noticed!

10) *****Low cost marketing idea #10 is to establish and maintain a good active Twitter account. To learn more about Twitter and how to make it effective for your small

11) *****Moving along with low cost marketing idea #11 have you fully updated your LinkedIn account on a regular basis? You must be at 100% on your profile, you need to update every week, you need a company page. Want to know more, take a look at:

14) *****The best low cost marketing idea I can give you is this. Learn how to connect your website, blog, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest and any other social media fads that appear in 2013 into a network. Learn how to use back links and directories. The more you work on your on-like presents, the more your small business will benefit!

15) Here is your top low cost marketing idea for 2013, in fact it is the most importaqnt idea you will hear in regards to marketing. In order for anything we have talked about to truly succeed, you need to develop a solid marketing plan! You need a road map, a plan to keep you on track to sustainable goals, and a ruler to judge your success. Part of this plan should include your established budget and an ongoing record of each fassett of your marketing plans success to determin what worked and what to rethink. All low cost marketing ideas are successful if you learn and grow from them.

Bonus Low Cost Marketing Idea: Consider hiring a marketing company to help you with a complete formula, if marketing is not your thing. A firm that does marketing for lots of companies can often deliver a great marketing campaign at a very low cost, compared to struggling with a part of small business that can confuse many. Be careful, there are a lot of firms that clams to know what they are doing, hire a firm that trains you to maintain your marketing plan.

With low cost marketing idea generating help, a good digital identity, a well branded small business and attention paid to your customers and their needs, success will be yours in 2013!

Pinterest Traffic Generating Tips to Pep Up Your Website

Presented by Thomas R. Reich PhD

I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Pinterest has been driving more traffic to blogs than its wealthier, larger companions Google+ and Twitter. Pinterest traffic generating tips will help you grow and thrive in 2013 and its changing social media landscape. The phenomenon is still in its infancy, yet the numbers don’t lie.

I have been telling you this for weeks, but the facts don’t lie! Pinterest is driving more traffic to blogs and websites than Google+, Twitter and LinkedIn combined. The thing is, Pinterest is still in its infancy and these Pinterest traffic generating tips will help you now, today!

If you haven’t read my recommendations on setting up your Pinterest account, see

. Today let’s look at 3 more cool tricks to help you succeed at Pinterest traffic generating tips!

Did you know that users on Pinterest are more engaged than users on Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn? Engaged enough to actually click through to your site! Think about it, community of people, who will actually leave the dominant social site and venture out for new discoveries on your website or blog. Here are 3 great Pinterest traffic generating tips to help you to internet success!

How can you make Pinterest work for your organization?

#1: Become a Pin It Player

Community building on Pinterest is now more valuable than ever, and with such high click through ratios – you need to grow your site now! Stats say that when people land on your site from Pinterest, they even stick around for longer than usual. To optimize your efforts here, you MUST start pinning like crazy.

But here’s the catch. Think of the things you pin as another way to curate niche specific content and attract targeted users. Only repin and comment on content that will lead the right people back to your pin board. They’ll check out your pins, and will be off to your blog in no time. That’s the power of curating relevant content on a site like Pinterest.

Time spent on Pinterest is time well spent. Remember the tricks you learned about URLs.

#2: Devise a Pin Posting Strategy

Your goal is traffic, which means you have to get people to really want to see your pins. That’s why when you post them, make sure that they are a talking point. Product images that are naturally beautiful will get repined, but you want that ‘viral’ effect. To get it, modify your product pin to be something out of the ordinary.

You must use professional pictures, you did in the days of traditional advertising and you need to now, it will pay off, Pinterest is the new Yellow Pages and right now it is FREE! Remember what you learned about Picture quality!

Don’t be afraid to try something new, daring or bizarre. Pinterest is the right place to do it. And keep in mind that most pinners are women. Cute, funny and inspirational are highly viral subjects to break into. Focus on these, and you’ll attract thousands of extra hits a day. If you are selling chairs, put a puppy in the chair, really think about it.

#3: Get Your Word of Mouth Marketing Ready

Pinterest is perhaps the one social place online where you can chat with real life brand advocates, and they’re normal people! Someone might find your purple shoes a great product and pin it to their wall. All of their Pinterest friends will comment, repin and share. Suddenly you have hundreds, even thousands of people loving your product.

If you are simply a blogger, link you blog to a great picture that represents visually what you are trying to say in the blog you want people to read.

The next step is to turn this into a marketing goldmine. Transplant some of your Facebook strategy into your Pinterest profile. Offer your advocates free samples, competitions, and exciting giveaways, and they’ll add user generated content to your profile.

Monitor your Pinterest metrics to see what works and what doesn’t. Want to know more about Pinterest for business? Ask me!

Change your images to reflect what your Pinterest community loves and shares. It’s not hard, and it will drive major league traffic to your blog and website!

7 Free Pinterest Tools; Things to get You Noticed!

Pinterest is fast becoming one of the biggest social media sites in the world and this means it is important to find its uses to expose your busines. The Pinterest tools contained in Pinterest can let you easily share any photos you find on the almost any website and socialize with anyone in the world through Pinterest. It makes sharing easier, and you can gain exposure with many more people who share your interest.

Pinterest is not just for image-sharing, u can even study your social activity and find out your score on Pinterest, so you’ll know how well your message is getting out, or by using a simple web application, find out how your social activity can potentially benefit you.

Here you will find 7 useful tools you can use with your Pinterest from analyzing your pinterest activity to study your score and influence, pinning quotes, adding additional button as well as activity column on Pinterest page.

1. Pinpuf

Pinpuff is a Pinterest tool where you can calculate your Pinfluence, a measure of your popularity on Pinterest and it also provides the value of your every pin. To get started with your analytics on Pinpuff, go to the website http://pinpuff.com/ and fill in your email and your Pinterest username, then click on the button ‘Calculate your Pinfluence’.

You will be redirected to your pinfluence page, where you will find your pinterest analytics.

In the score page, you will be presented with your total score at the right hand sidebar next to your Pinterest profile image. You will also get to know an estimation of your pin valuation as well as cost per click. Apart from that, you will see your reach score based on your follower and activity score. It is just for fun but gives you an idea of how you are doing getting attention with your pins!

There’s also a virility score, and you can also find out the total followers, pins, repins and likes of each board you created in Pinterest.

2. Pinreach

Similar to Pinpuff, Pinreach is a Pinterest tool that also provides you with analytics to study your influence on Pinterest except without the value estimation you can find in Pinpuff. It does however have othe features to offer.

To use Pinreach, visit the website and click on the ‘Sign Up’ button and fill up the registration form together with your Pinterest username.

When registration is completed, you will be redirected to your analytics page. There are four tabs available on Pinreach to study your Pinterest activity in details.

Analytics

The first tab ‘Analytics’ is where you will be able to see your total pins, repins, likes, followers and more from the right sidebar, and you will also see graph of your score as well as activity changes since you last login to Pinreach.

Boards

Boards will show you the total number of pins, repins, followers and comments based on boards you created on Pinterest.

Pins

The Pins tab will show you a collection of your popular pins on pinterest.

Influential Followers

This tab will let you know who are among your followers has a strong influence on Pinterest. You can also click on their image to find out their Pinreach.

3. Pin A Quote

Pin A Quote is a Pinterest tool that allows you to post a quote to Pinterest. Although this is just a small part of what you can get from Pinstamatic, Pin A Quote makes it easy with their bookmarklet – you can simply post a quote by highlighting a text on any website much like how you Pin an image from a site.

To grab the bookmarklet, visit the Pin A Quote homepage, drag the button ‘Pin A Quote’ to your browser’s bookmark bar, and it is ready for use.

To pin a quote to Pinterest, all you need to do is simply highlight any sentence or quote you found on any website, then click on the Pin A Quote bookmarklet. A form will appear, fill it up and post it to your Pinterest.

4. Pin Search

Pin Search is an extension for Chrome browser and is a Pinterest tool that will let you easily find more related photos and information of a photo you found on Pinterest.

To start using, head over to the Pin Search extension page on your Chrome browser and click ‘Add to Chrome’.

Once added to Chrome, open the Pinterest website and you will see an additional ‘Search’ button at the bottom of the ‘Comment’ button, when you hover over any images on Pinterest.

Clicking on this ‘Search’ button will direct you to a Google’s search results page that is related to the image you selected.

5. Recent Activity Expander

Also an extension for Chrome, Recent Activity Expander is a Pinterest tool that will add an extra column on the left side of your Pinterest page, and list down all recent activity related to your account. It allows you to see who has followed and repinned your items since your last login.

To start using, head over to Recent Activity Expander‘s Chrome extension page and add it to your Chrome. Once added, open Pinterest website and you will see your Recent Activities in a column on the left.

6. Pinterest Right-Click

Pinterest Right-Click is an extension for your Firefox browser, it adds an additional right-click item to your right-click menu so you can pin any photos you found on the Internet.

To get this Pinterest tool, open the Pinterest Right-Click extension page on your Firefox and install.

Now when installation is completed, you can search or browse any images from your Firefox, and when you find any photos you want to pin to Pinterest, right-click on the image and select ‘Pin image’.

When you selected ‘Pin Image’, as usual a popup window will appear for you to fill up the details of the image, which board you want to post the image to etc. Once completed, select ‘Pin it’.

7. Pinterest Pro

Pinterest Pro is another Pinterest tool for Chrome extension that comes with 3 main features to enhance your Pinterest experience: ‘Pin to Pinterest’ accessible by the right-click menu, image zooming and ‘Popular Pin Dropdown’.

You can have these features on your Chrome browser by installing Pinterest Pro from the extension page. To pin a photo, just select ‘Pin to Pinterest’ by right click. A new tab will appear; fill up with the details of the image and it will be posted on your Pinterest board.

When you browse a Pinterest page, you can enlarge every pinned image without having to click on that image. Simply hover over any image with your cursor and the image will be enlarged.

The third feature is the Popular Pin Down button you can find at the top-right corner of your browser. Click this button to check out the latest popular content on Pinterest without having to load the website.

Conclusion

Now with these 7 tools, you can start to analyze your social activity on Pinterest and do more research on how to reach your audiences or grab more influence that would be beneficial for Marketing your product, service or event.

Pinterest is a tool to help connect people with your products and drive them back to your site; it is another tool to draw attention to your product or service.

So why is Pinterest different, why is it getting so much attention? First, the site generates a huge amount of web traffic. Second, it has become a major traffic referral site. Pinterest matters because a lot of people are on Pinterest and a lot of people are using Pinterest.

In increasing numbers, people are making purchasing decisions based on Pinterest. They search for a product or services, see a visual comparison and then click on the image that interests them. This takes them directly back to the source website of the product or service.

Pinterest gives people a different way to connect with products and services. Google search is one way Pinterest search is becoming another. Pinterest is a way to have new customers stumble upon products and services in a new way, it’s beautiful, stunning, requires little thought to search effectively and it’s new, a great combination for social media.

You can start getting your products and services on Pinterest even if you are not a Pinterest site user. Your products and services may already be on Pinterest. Here is a simple trick to find out if they are. Go to the URL bar at the top of your browser and type http://pinterest.com/source/yourURL. The results will be all the people who are pinning your products or services.

So, the meat is how to get others to pin your products or services so their followers will see the pins as well as your followers. Here are some basics to get products and services pinned:

1) Give people something great to pin. Make sure you are creating content that people will want to share. Great product photography and graphics helps and creative displays are the key to visual acceptance.

a) Great product photography. Your supplier could be the source of this, but tag it to your website, not theirs.

b) Great life/style photography. Create settings and situations that show your product or service in action. Also showing your employees in a fun working environment while creating the product or service can send a positive message.

c) Pin great content. You can pin video tutorials, infographics and testimonials tied to your products and services, which should link browsers back to your website.

d) Great video content. Create fun videos that relate to your product or service but entertain. Remember to link back to your website.

2) Do your research, search for similar products and services, and see what others are pinning and which are the most successful. What catches your eye? What do you see and say, “I could do better than that,” or “I have a better picture than what they are using?”

3) Make it easy for people to pin what you post. Make it as easy as possible for people to find an image on your website and get it on to Pinterest. Make sure to include “Pin It” buttons everywhere on your website where you have a lot of images. This says to a visitor to your site, “if you like these images, feel free to pin them to your Pinterest site.”

4) Encourage people to pin your products and services. Go a step further, offer a 10% discount for Pinterest users that create a board of your products and services. The traffic generated by a promotion of this mature is potentially mind boggling! Once a Pinterest user pins your product, it gets repinned and repinned over and over.

5) Remember that even if your website is not mobile friendly, Pinterest is, so it gives the mobile community access to your products and services instantly. The mobile optimization of your content is done for you automatically on the Pinterest site.

6) All pins to your Pinterest site can be automatically tweeted to your Twitter fans and posted to your Facebook page by simply clicking a convenient share button on the Pinterest site; adding to its power as part of your social media network.

For a successful Pinterest site, engage with the Pinterest community. Have boards related to your products or services but not just your products or services. Even on the boards that specifically promote your products and services, have other items and eye candy that enhances the experience of your products and services. This will help establish you as an authority in your field, not just a product pusher. This can help your Pinterest site rank higher in the search results within Pinterest itself and within Google searches.

The best way to make Pinterest work for you is to create great photography, great photographic content, and great videos to create story with pictures. Put useful captions on all posts, make sure all content is linked to your website and make all pictures and graphic content pinnable from your website by installing the “Pin It” button on every page with pinnable content.

Remember, like any social media, Pinterest is just a tool; it is a tool to connect people with your products and services and bring them back to your website. Do not over think this, the better your products and services, the better the chance you will draw traffic back to your website where the selling is done. Pinterest is not a sales tool; it is part of an overall social media network, that work together to bring traffic to your website.